Breaking the Rat
by w0rdpainter
Summary: Peter Pettigrew faces the Dark Lord--but is it torture, or just persuasion? One-shot. Done for the Kidnapped challenge on the HPFC forum. My first challenge!


**Author's Note: Written for sick-atxxheart's Kidnapped challenge on the Harry Potter Fanfiction Challenges forum. Characters belong to J.K. Rowling, various lines are prompts from sick-atxxheart.**

**-**

In times of turmoil, strength is vital. Not just physical strength, but also strength of character, conviction, and mind. This strength can come from many sources. Peter Pettigrew, for example, found his at the bottom of a large mug of firewhisky. Or eight.

He sat at the bar in the Leaky Cauldron one cold spring evening, nursing a mug that may even have put him in the double digits. The stools around him sat empty. Peter preferred to do his drinking alone, leaving his friends to their nights in with elf-made wine and hushed conversations about the Order and the war. After enough drinks, he could pretend that everything was fine, and he could go home safely at night without fearing for his life and the live of everyone he knew. Just a few more…

Tom, the barkeeper, eyed the small-statured man warily. His beady eyes had gone bloodshot and his small, pointed nose was red. When Peter slammed down a few more sickles, Tom refused them. The man had clearly had enough. Tom asked him, politely, to head home. After all, these were dangerous times. Nobody would want to be wandering around late at night, inebriated, when dark forces were afoot. Sober, Peter might have agreed. As he was, however, he decided to disregard Tom's advice. If he couldn't get service at the Leaky Cauldron, he'd find a muggle bar. London was filthy with them.

Peter stumbled onto the lamp-lit street without so much as a nod to anyone on his way out. He peered up and down the way, but in all honesty he had no idea where he was going. The Leaky Cauldron was the only building he knew for blocks. Squinting at the street signs, he set off looking for anywhere advertising alcohol. He barely noticed as the lights faded and he meandered into a seedy alley.

It was dark when he heard the sound, and immediately he pulled out his wand and lit it, but it was too late. The whisky slowed his reaction time to a crawl. Dark shapes whirled around him. From somewhere came a girlish cackle. Then he saw the wave of a wand and everything went black.

-

"Oi, Moony!"

Remus Lupin looked up from his book to see Sirius Black looking out the window, frowning. "Yes?"

"Did Wormtail come home last night?"

Remus put down the book. "You know, I don't think he did."

Sirius frowned harder, his brow furrowed. "I told him not to go alone, we have drinks here if he needed one so badly."

"Well, maybe he went to stay with James and Lily." Remus went to confirm this through a Floo message, and came up disappointed. "They haven't seen him either."

"I feel like we should go look for him," Sirius declared. "I have a bad feeling about this." Remus agreed, and after waiting most of a day in the idealistic hope that he would turn up, they enlisted some help and set out for Peter's usual haunts.

They searched everywhere for him, but he was gone.

-

Peter awoke in a cold, dank room with a massive headache. Dawn light came in through a tiny, grimy window high on a stone wall. Struggling to see his surroundings, he eventually made out a wooden door in the far corner. He was not surprised to find it locked, but panic engulfed him anyway. Hung over… alone… and imprisoned… most likely by Death Eaters.

As terrified as Peter was to be captive, he was simultaneously amazed and overjoyed to be alive. How many people did he know who had already become casualties of the war? Too often it seemed that both sides followed the policy "Kill first, ask questions later."

Then it occurred to him that he was dealing with You-Who-Know, who had long since proven to be a merciless, calculating opponent. If he was alive, it was surely for a reason. Topping the list that Peter could imagine was information. He shuddered at the thought. He had never been particularly strong or noble; he doubted he could stand up to torture for long. Somehow he would have to get out of there.

He tried for hours to escape, but eventually he realized it was hopeless. He would just have to wait for his captors to come to the door. He had one last trick up his sleeve, however, and he clung to the dire hope that his unique skill as an animagus would be unforeseen.

-

"My Lord, I've just been in to see the prisoner, and I think he's gone."

The Death Eater cowered as his brutal master turned those soulless red eyes to glare at him. "That is impossible," he answered simply.

"There's no one there, my Lord, I swear it."

If it was possible for those crimson slits to narrow any further, they did so. "That room is inescapable. Furthermore, I can feel a human presence there. Or do you forget that I am a powerful Legilimens?"

"Of course I do not mean to belittle your skills, my Lord. Never that. But there is nothing in that room but dirt and vermin."

"Bring it to me!"

"The dirt, my Lord?"

"The rat, you insufferable fool."

-

When the Death Eater returned after checking on him and chased Peter into a corner, his tiny rat heart raced. He was sure he'd be killed, it was all over now… With his eyes squeezed shut, he tried not to let his life flash before them. He would break under pressure, he knew it…

When he opened his eyes again, he looked up into the most terrifying sight he could imagine: Lord Voldemort's pale, noseless face sizing him up. "This is not a rat," he said in a flat tone. He pointed his wand at Peter. In a flash of blue-white light, Peter found himself returning to normal size and shape quite against his will. No longer able to hide, Peter shrank away from the Dark Lord.

"I-I won't talk," he stammered. "Even if you kill me, I won't."

"First of all," Voldemort said coldly, "you would talk. Easily. But I do not want to kill you, Peter Pettigrew. Your death would be useless to me. Your-" he hesitated to choose his words, "-_allies_, they do not need you. You are no great talent, no asset to them. With or without you, they will fall."

Peter winced. James and Lily had been the best of their year at Hogwarts. Half the Order were trained Aurors. And Dumbledore headed the group, for Merlin's sake. You-Know-Who had a point, he had nothing to add to that.

"No matter how illustrious your little gang is, they cannot withstand me. How many have already fallen?"

Peter couldn't begin to count the losses the Order had faced. _The Prewetts… Marlene… Dorcas…_

"Dorcas Meadowes, yes. I killed her myself. She begged for her life, at the end. They all do. But you do not have to, Peter Pettigrew. As I have said, your friends will fall. Will you fall with them?"

It occurred to Peter in a petrifying instant. _He's in my head._ Peter knew of Legilimency and Occlumency, but he couldn't dream of performing them. His best option was to try desperately to think of meaningless things. Instead, fear for his life distracted him, and old secrets kept popping up to the surface.

"You need not tell me these things unwillingly… Wormtail." A look of what might have once been amusement crossed Voldemort's twisted features. "You need not share your friends' fate. I can protect you in ways they never could."

"I-I can't… I won't… betray them." Despite his insistence, Peter's voice was small.

"You will beg for my protection, Wormtail."

"I would… never…"

Voldemort nodded to his minion. The Death Eater raised his wand. "Crucio!"

-

The torture went on in fits and starts for the better part of an hour before Peter fell, broken in mind and body, to the Dark Lord's feet.

"Y-you will protect me?"

Voldemort's gash-like mouth curled upward into a sneering, bastardized smile. "I can offer you more protection than Dumbledore and his pathetic Order ever could. Wormtail, the bravest thing one can do is admit that he was wrong. You were wrong to put your trust in them. Join me, and you escape their doom."

Peter thought once more of his friends, who had been his salvation from bullies and obscurity throughout his years of school. They were strong, yes, but how could they compare to this? The Dark Lord could see into their heads, turn their own thoughts against them… surely he was invincible.

"I'll do it."

-

Sirius was the one who found him, broken and bleeding, on the streets near Diagon Alley. Peter was in rat form, but of course his friend could track him nonetheless. They returned to Order headquarters to heal Peter and hear of his ordeal.

Peter related a tale of torture and narrow escape. He had slipped out, he said, in rat form. No one thought to question him further after all he had gone through. Even if they had, he would have stood up to anything. After all, Voldemort had fed him all the details for a believable story. The Order hailed Peter as a courageous survivor and welcomed him back heartily.

Months later, Sirius recounted Peter's supposed endurance against torture while convincing James Potter to switch his Secret-Keeper.

-

"My Lord! The Potters… from the prophecy… I can tell you where they are."

Voldemort smiled his twisted smile. Breaking the rat had been well worthwhile.


End file.
